In This Lesson
Labour Welfare
Indian Labour Force
Need For Labour Welfare

Labour Welfare
According to ILO, "The labour force is the sum of persons in employment plus
persons in unemployment"
Together these two groups of the population represent the current supply of
labour for the production of goods and services taking place in a country through
market transactions in exchange for remuneration.
Labour force is one of the main driving force of Indian economy. It has the
capability to define the growth and development.
.
Labour force in India ranges from large numbers of illiterate workers to a sizeable
pool of highly educated and skilled professionals
.

Labour Welfare
There is a sharp divide between organized and unorganized sector in India.
.
. The stringent laws and rules available for the small proportion of organised
labour enables them to fight for their rights.
.But the majority of them in the unorganized sector do not have these luxuries
and most often they are unemployed with no social security.
.Out of India's 1.3 billion population, 70 per cent live in villages and 40-45 per cent
can be categorized as the working population.
This worker population ratio, has roughly remained the same since
Independence.

Labour Welfare
. India has amongst the lowest women's labour force participation rates (LFPR) in
the world.
The gender gap in labour force participation rate is more than 50 percentage
points. The lower participation of women in economic activities adversely affects
the growth potential of the economy.
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Women workers are the most disadvantaged in the labour market as they
constitute a very high proportion among the low skilled informal worker
category, and are engaged in low-productivity and low paying work.
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.Owing to this, women earn very low wages, mostly piece rates in highly insecure
jobs.

Labour Welfare
India's labour domain is heavily dependent on agriculture which accounts for
close to 50 per cent of the total workforce.
.
The agricultural sector still accounts for 62.7 per cent of India's rural
employment. Significantly, agriculture contributes only one sixth of the GDP of
the country.
.
Non-agricultural sector accounts for about half the work force, but it contributes
approximately 80 per cent to the total GDP.
.
. Of the total employment in the organized sector, almost 65 to 70 per cent is in
the public sector.

Labour Welfare
The majority of workers in India are in informal employment. Wherein 92 per
cent of the workforce is in informal employment and less than 10 per cent is in
formal employment
Post 1990 reforms, due to change in macroeconomic policies and declining
public investment in the primary sector strained agricultural sector. This also lead
to lack of labour absorption in agriculture.
The displaced agricultural labourers were compelled to look for jobs in the
non-agricultural sector.
Even people find few jobs in manufacturing sector. The share of the
manufacturing sector in the overall national income has been stagnant around
15-16 per cent since the early 1990s.

Labour Welfare
Even during the periods of high economic growth, employment expansion has
been negligible, and has employment elasticity has tended to decline across
almost all the sectors during the last three decades.
The core of the Indian growth pattern is centered on the expansion of the service
sector, which has a predominance of both vulnerable casual and
self-employment.
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All these has lead to high informalisation of Indian economy

Labour Welfare
Need For Labour Welfare
.Since India is a developing economy aiming at rapid economic and social
development, the necessity of labour welfare is most here.
The main aspect of labour welfare is to secure an improved standard of living for
the workers, which effects on the worker's psychology and results in an increase
in their productive efficiencies
The industrial workers in India today constitute functionally a very significant
vulnerable element of the country's population. They also contribute
substantially to the nation's economy.
.

Labour Welfare
.The working conditions in Indian industries are not satisfactory.
They face lots of problems like long hours of work in unhealthy surroundings,
rural attachment, unfriendly factory environment, etc.
.Compared to other countries, the percentage of educated workers is very low,
and consequently they are not in a position to understand their own interests
and interests of employer and the society. Hence labour welfare is required more
in India than in other countries.
.Indian industries are far behind than other developed countries. Industrial
programme is dependent upon the efficiency of labour. Welfare measures
motivate the workers and maintain their efficiency and productivity